


Three Steps Forward, One Step Back

by Musyc



Category: Harry Potter - Fandom
Genre: Community: dmhgficexchange, Developing Relationship, Draco Malfoy - character, Drama, EWE, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Hermione Granger - character, Humor, Miscarriage, Post-War, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-27
Updated: 2009-11-27
Packaged: 2017-10-03 20:39:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Musyc/pseuds/Musyc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When tracing a relationship step by step, sometimes they move forward, sometimes they fall back. In the end, they find they can move in step. The tracing of a relationship in fifteen short vignettes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Steps Forward, One Step Back

_01._  
Three weeks after the war was over, an owl arrived at her home, startling her with a knock on her window. Orange eyes and tufted ears made it a species she didn't recognize immediately, an owl that wasn't from her friends. It clutched a small packet in one set of talons, balanced on her windowsill with the other, and tapped insistently at the glass with its beak, staring in at her. She stood watching it for a moment, the collar of her shirt clutched in her fingers, material wrinkled up in her grasp. With a deep breath, she shook her head, called herself silly for being frightened of it, then opened the window and held a treat out to it before she took the package. The owl ate with surprising daintiness for its sizable bulk and flew off with a deep hoot that somehow managed to carry dignity.

She opened the packet on her kitchen table and stared at the contents, her breath caught in her throat. An elegantly-scripted note rested on top of a emerald green bottle, sealed with black wax. She knew the handwriting immediately, and wished she didn't. Wondered how she _did_.

_Granger.  
I couldn't stop her. I wouldn't have been allowed. I didn't want to watch, and I regret that I did. No one deserves that. If you're still experiencing any pain because of my aunt's playtime, this should help. My own brew._

I'm sorry.  
\--DLM

  
_02._  
The cobblestones outside the Menagerie were slick and wet with rain, the same rain that darkened the stones of the wall around her garden, the same rain that puddled around the small, rounded stone at the foot of that wall, soaking into the carved name and the dirt over a well-beloved Kneazle far better than any tears had done. She skidded on the cobblestones, caught herself on the door frame, then wiped water from her cheek and stepped inside, a bell jangling as she pushed her hood back. The call and caw of birds and toads, the squeak of bats and rats, the warm scent of breath and breakfasts, all of it rose and surrounded her as she moved down one aisle, her fingers trailing over thin, sturdy bars and latches. The shopkeeper's voice floated to her, "Be with you when I'm done with this gentleman," and she nodded silently, her eyes focused on a large and open-topped box full of kittens. They mewed and mewled, pawing at the glass with tiny, furry feet, smudging it with tiny, pink tongues and noses. Her hand slipped into the box, her nails scratching behind ears and along spines.

Tiger-stripes butted against her thumb, calico wrapped paws around her wrist. Tuxedo black and white stretched to crawl over ginger and white, little claws stretched out and up towards her. A bump against her back knocked her into the side of the box with a grunt and chorus of disgruntled mews. She looked over her shoulder, view obscured by strands of dark hair curled even worse by the rain. Until she heard the tiny feline growl that followed, she thought she'd made the almost silent hiss at seeing the grey eyes and pointed face of a memory she'd tried to forget. He stepped up beside her, eyes focused on hers. "New pet?" She nodded after several long seconds, then looked and reached back into the small mound of fur and tails. A fluffy white kitten with a yellow ear purred and licked at the tips of her fingers, and she felt the corners of her mouth quirk not even a millimeter in the bare ghost of a smile.

He reached into the box, stroking along the spine of the smallest kitten before picking it up and turning it over in his hands. "Boy," he noted, then held the tiny ball of black fluff to his chest. It almost blended in to the dark fabric of his cloak, gold eyes the only visible color in the cradle of his fingers until a yawn displayed white fangs and pink tongue. Hermione turned away from watching long fingers rubbing a furry forehead, from hearing the almost inaudible rumble of a purr mixed with the far deeper murmur of his voice as he talked to the kitten he held.

She watched the white kitten ignore her attempts at regaining its attention, watched it choose instead to leap across the box and land with all four feet in the water bowl, splashing another kitten in the face and making it sneeze. The look of surprise on its face was almost as comical as the indignant yowl of the now-damp kitten, and to her own surprise, he laughed, his arm pressing against hers as he shifted position. He held the black kitten out to her and she took it, eyebrows raising in question. "Take him," he said, fingers brushing the back of her hand as he pulled away. "Don't trust the pale ones. They're always the meanest, even if they don't intend to be. They just don't know any better."

With an incline of his head, he stepped backwards and away. His boots clicked across the floor, the doorbell jangled, and as the shopkeeper hurried to her side, she glanced up, her ghost of a smile becoming fully visible. "This one, Miss?" the man asked, reaching for the black kitten.

"Yes," she said, then looked down into the box for a moment before snatching up the white kitten, stopping its pounce on a sleeping calico. "And this one. They can be friends."

  
_03._  
The first time they fucked was after some mutually acquaintanced, greetings in the lift, oh him yes him, Ministry employee's garden party. She worked in the same department, he worked with the man's wife. He spent the entire night nursing one glass of a rather inferior Cabernet. She downed half a bottle after finding her _as soon as I get him alone for five minutes tomorrow morning he's going to be an ex_-boyfriend in a pile of coats in the bedroom with a blonde in his dingy y-fronts. She shut the door very slowly, shut her eyes very tightly, and said "bugger" very quietly.

When she opened her eyes, he was holding the bottle out to her, and she took it in one hand and his loosened tie in the other. Her fingers crawled up the length of the silk, hooked in the knot, and ripped it free from his collar to crumple on the floor. The only movement he made was a slight flutter of his pale lashes, and his eyes stayed focused on hers. She licked a drop of wine off the bottle's neck, then stretched up on her toes and licked the curve of his bottom lip.

By the time they were in the taxi, her knickers were wet, his shirt was untucked, and she'd discovered that his throat had three separate spots that made him hiss. By the time they were at his flat, the bottle and her knickers were in the taxi and she'd found a fourth spot on his neck that made him writhe. He dropped his keys on the floor as soon as they were inside, wrapped her hair around his hands to tip her head back for a kiss, and muttered a curse under his breath when she pinned him to the door and dragged her fingers down his zip.

He didn't wear dingy y-fronts with the worn-out elastic that she'd begged him to change in case someone saw them in an accident. Or, as it turned out, on purpose in a nest of coats and dark-brown roots. He didn't wear y-fronts at all. Or boxers or boxer-briefs or even briefs. Beneath the flap of his trousers, when she undid his belt and slid her fingers under the waistband, was the warm skin of his hip, a vee of hair almost as soft as on his head, and nothing else at all blocking her from pressing her palm against his cock.

She'd drunk enough wine that she couldn't get off, but his amused offer to hold back and make it fair had her digging her nails into the small of his back with a growl. His response was a groan, his forehead pressed to her shoulder, and she stroked one hand up his spine as he stiffened, turned over to lick his throat again when he rolled off her and panted for breath with one hand flung out to the edge of the bed. As she dressed and smoothed her hair into an elastic, the hunt for her right shoe vexing and awkward by moonlight, he exhaled a thin stream of smoke from a Sobranie Black, and spoke to the ceiling. "Next time, you'll get two."

She stayed until morning.

She had four.

  
_04._  
He asked her out via memo.

_RE: Dinner.  
Friday. 8:00. Wear the red dress you wore to the Christmas party and I won't say one word about Weasley the whole night. Wear it without knickers and I won't say one word about Potter._

There was a note at the bottom, from his secretary.  
_If you say no, let us know. There's a queue to try and get him out, and my number's next._

She didn't wear knickers.

  
_05._  
She waited outside the cafe for their usual Tuesday lunch, alternating between wondering how and when it had become 'usual' and tapping her toe as she checked her watch. She thought that maybe she should have asked, should have verified that he'd be available, but she'd assumed he'd just _be_ there. He always _was_. Chilled to her fingertips and cold in her chest, she went inside to wait and warm up. There, she finished a pot of tea and seven biscuits before someone sat at her table and she looked up from her book with a smile that faded immediately. "Oh, it's you."

"Nice greeting." Harry pulled his glasses off and wiped the lenses on his shirt.

"I was waiting for Dra-someone." She focused on her book, one hand holding it open, one hand fisted in her lap under the table.

Harry drummed his fingers on the table for a moment, then he snagged a biscuit and spoke with a spray of crumbs. The Boy Who Lived Without Table Manners. "Yeah, Malfoy. I know. We all know. Whole sodding Ministry knows." He swallowed, sighed, shifted in his chair. "He's not coming."

She bent over her book further, her hair falling around her face and blocking her eyes. Despite the warmth of the tea she'd drunk, her chest still felt cold. She laughed, ignoring the thick and sticky feel of it in her throat, and turned a page. "Don't tell me he sent _you_, of all people, to break it off for him."

Harry snorted. "I wish." Holding up a hand before she could protest, he sighed again. "I volunteered. He's not coming because he went to hospital. Got in a fight. Impressive, really, he's a skinny little shit, but it took three of us to pull him off Zabini. Didn't think he had it in him without Goyle around."

She snapped her head up at 'hospital', gasped at 'fight', and stared blankly at 'Zabini'. With a shake of her head that sent her hair flying around her shoulders, she snatched up her book and purse, chair shoved back with a screech. "What what what _what_ happened?" she sputtered, heading for the Floo. "Blaise is his best friend, why did they get in a fight, why is he in hospital, what happened? _Harry_!" Harry pushed her into the Floo and followed, and with a nauseating spin and halt, they were at Mungos and _he_ was walking towards them. Arm in a cast and sling, a split lip, a black eye.

He fumbled for his cigarettes awkwardly and she smacked his hand. "This is a hospital!" A thump to his chest with her palm. "What were you _thinking_?" Another thump, this time with her book. "Are you some sort of idiot?"

He flicked two fingers at Harry, who seemed to be hysterically amused by something, then fixed his eyes on her so sharply that she froze, silent. "I'm fine, _thanks_. Though it's a good thing they gave me plenty of potions." He glared at her. "I'm going to need them for the pain in my arse." Even wounded, he managed an arrogant strut out the door, and she whipped around to spear Harry with her own glare.

"_Well_?"

Harry straightened up and made the third glare in two minutes. "He got in a fight. With Zabini. Over _you_. Surprised the hell out of pretty much everyone in the office, but there you go." Gesturing at the door, he shrugged. "Follow the man, for god's sake. If he'll take down his best friend for calling you a Mudblood, he's obviously got some human emotions in him. Catch up with him before he loses them again."

After a moment of stunned and silent gaping, she ran faster than she ever had in her life, and by the time she was finished kissing him, their mouths were coated in blood from his torn lip. His painkillers came in very handy the next morning.

For both of them.

  
_06._  
The telly's remote fascinated him. He'd spend ten minutes pushing the buttons, changing channels, playing with the settings, and he always, _always_ left the volume high enough to make her jump when she turned the set back on. No matter how often she scolded him, no matter how many times she stomped her foot and threatened to sell the set just so he'd learn to stop messing with the fucking contrast it's fine where it is don't fucking _touch_ it again!, he still would. And she'd just scold him again. She couldn't get rid of the set. He played with it every time he came over to visit, like a beloved toy.

She watched him one afternoon from the kitchen, watched him sitting on the edge of the sofa with channel after channel flipping across the screen, and managed to restrain herself to a smile until she realized each change of the channel was made with the remote going through the air, swish and flick. She laughed so hard she spit tea down her shirt and he was too distracted with 'helping' her get it and her bra off to ask what had been so funny.

  
_07._  
His flat was neat and tidy, almost obsessively clean. His shirts were hung up by color, his boots each had a clear box with a label. Every photo on the wall was exactly straight, every book on the shelf lined up flush with the edge. When he wasn't looking, she'd push one book back, just a fingertip's length. It never took him more than three minutes to notice, she timed him on it, and he'd be over at the shelf, carefully aligning the spines again.

He alphabetized his teas.

Every handle on every mug pointed the same direction, every potion bottle was arranged by size and shape. He made the bed as soon as they got up, and every hair she shed on his pillows, sofa, or carpet was an attack on justice, cleanliness, and decency.

For their fourth date, they stayed in, and he cooked, ignoring her pointed comments about knowing how to operate an oven and her marveling at the manly way he wielded a lemon zester. She kept every last crumb over her plate, and she straightened a photo on the way to the loo. When she joined him in the kitchen to do the washing up, her hair was pulled back in a tight braid, not one strand loose to fall into the water.

He made it to the last dish before he flung the sponge across the room, shoved her onto the table, and fucked her until her braid came undone, his shirt lost a button under the fridge, and they both stained the tablecloth. After that night, she pushed back his books, tilted his pictures, and reorganized all his shirts by pretentiousness. He left things as she placed them because it made her laugh.

The teas stayed alphabetized.

By "T".

  
_08._  
Her sleep was even and calm, her dream about a house made of books, with curtain-pages over the windows and an index-staircase up to the second chapter. The scream woke her, and she sat bolt upright, one hand clamped to her chest, the other falling onto his thigh. The muscle was tense beneath her palm and she was sure the sound had woken him as well, but when she turned to look at him, his eyes were closed. Closed tight, closed far too tight, and just as she leaned over to examine his face, he tipped his head back and screamed again, a long and drawn-out cry that rang in her ears and made her heart pound.

She called his name, cupped his cheeks in her hands, frantically patted his face in a desperate effort to wake him, and his eyes snapped open but he didn't see her. He saw something else, he saw something that made him scream once more, then his hand snapped up and wrapped around her throat. She choked, she grabbed his wrist with both hands and tugged at his arm, but he was as solid as the pale marble his skin resembled in moonlight, and his eyes were wild and dark. He squeezed down, pressing the breath out of her throat, and she pried at his fingers, her mouth opening without sound.

He sat up, shoved her down, and loomed over her, his face twisted with hate and his voice falling out of his mouth in a low, chanting rumble. I'll kill you, I hate you, I hate what you've done to me, _you_ did this, you bastard, you ruined my life, you ruined my family, and I'll kill you, I want to _kill_ you, I want your blood on my hands, I want to swim in it, drown in it, I want you to _pay_ and damn you to _hell_ for letting Potter get to you first.

She stilled.

She looked up at him, looked up at the sneering grimace on her lover's face and saw a sixteen year old boy, sent to die for his father's mistakes, sent to torture and kill in the hope of saving a family ruled by fear. He squeezed down tighter, still chanting his nightmare, his litany for his Lord. Her vision went grey around the edges, as grey as his eyes, and she slowly reached up, stroking the backs of her knuckles across his cheek and collecting teardrops on her fingers. "I'm sorry," she murmured, and as his head tilted in a brief moment of confusion, she used the last of her air and the last of her strength to snap one knee up.

He collapsed, gasping and choking, and she shoved him over, shoved him off her, bolted out of the bed and grabbed her wand, wheeling around to hit him with a Stunning spell in the middle of his launch off the bed and after her. He collapsed again, sprawled onto the floor at her feet, one hand outstretched and his face finally calm. She dropped her wand, dropped to her knees, eyes streaming with tears from the pain of her ravaged throat and his ravaged youth. Drawing him into her arms, she cradled him against her chest and rocked, rocked gently, weeping into his hair until the sun rose.

  
_09._  
They were a couple for six months before he finally admitted that she was complete and utter rubbish at blow jobs and he'd rather she didn't do them at all if she was going to continue being that bad at them. After she threw him out of her house and sulked for a day, she did what was only right and proper and the best way to handle every situation.

She got a book.

Four books, actually. She read and studied and underlined paragraphs and made notes in the margins and when she finally let him back in the door and back in her bed, she made him gasp and made him growl and made him beg. A lick up the thick vein under the shaft, fluttering kisses across the head. She dropped her jaw and hollowed her cheeks and the only time she used her teeth, she meant to. By the time he locked his hands in her hair and came with a shout and an arch to his spine that lifted his hips off the mattress, she determined that she didn't even mind swallowing for him. Less mess, certainly.

Around gasps for air and panting for breath, his chest rising and falling so fast that she couldn't even rest her head on him, he sputtered out praise and awed swearing. She lifted up to smirk at him and tapped the point of his nose with one finger. "Outstanding. Say it."

"Fuck me, woman, you get a NEWT in oral. Outstanding plus honors and a sodding blue ribbon."

"Good boy."

  
_10._  
The process was gradual, slow enough that she barely noticed. A shirt left one night, files from the office on another. She kept a box of the fruit rings and marshmallows cereal that he liked best in the cupboard, bought a bottle of brandy in addition to her beer. Condoms lived in the drawers of the tables on both sides of the bed, not just hers. He had a _side_ of the bed. He had a key. He had his own toothpaste because she left hers open and always squeezed from the middle. He turned the junk room into an extra office and disposed of all the junk, which she was secretly glad about because she didn't have to do it, and (she didn't even try to be) secretly amused by because he'd done it without a single house-elf.

Before she even realized it, the bureau drawers were exactly divided down the center, an extra bookshelf was in the bedroom and was stuffed full of potions texts and Quidditch strategy guides. On the mantle over the Floo, between Harry waving wildly with a hippogriff feather and Ron mugging for the camera with Fredandgeorge, a blond couple gazed down at a blond boy who leapt into the air, caught a Snitch, and released it, over and over and over again. She picked up the photo, and the boy and the woman smiled at her. After a few moments, even Lucius smiled and nodded his head in a short gesture of greeting before turning away and placing a hand on his son's shoulder.

  
_11._  
She had a long day at the office, her mother found a lump that "was nothing, dear, don't worry", and he left the newspaper where the cats could get to it and by the time she came home the only readable bits left were the stock quotes from MKS to TSCO. She called him a puerile pureblood prat, he called her an alliterative bitch, and when he stormed out without his coat, he slammed the door hard enough to knock their photo off the wall and shatter the glass in the frame.

He wasn't worth crying over, she told herself as she pushed Serpent and Gryff away from the dustpan and broken glass for the seventh time. Never had been. He was what he was, and there was no point in tears, and the reason she used up a box of Kleenex by the following night was an onset of allergies, nothing more, and she didn't miss him and wouldn't. Two days and another box later, she shoved up the window to shout at whoever was playing their music far too loudly, and stared slack-jawed at the blond man standing on the pavement in front of a car with all four doors wide open. "Couldn't find a stereo," he shouted up to her, "so I hope this will do."

_Without a noise, without my pride, I reach out from the inside_, and she was on the pavement facing him with her bare feet cold and her hair unbrushed. "What in god's name are you _doing_?" she shrieked, arms flung wide in a gesture that encompassed the insanity of causing a spectacle where Gemma Hawkins next door and Faiza Srivastava across the street could watch and stare and start the rounds of ringing all the _other_ women in the gossip chain.

He blinked at her, three steady blinks, then took a step back to lean against the car, his head bowed. "I couldn't find a stereo that was the right sort," he said again, voice loud to carry over _I look to the time with you to keep me awake and alive_. "Don't know where to buy those. Took me long enough to find this song." His cheeks puffed out on a exhale and he studied his nails closely before rubbing his palm across the light stubble on his jaw. "Thought that was your favorite moving. You've only made me watch it six dozen times."

"Movie. Yes. It is." She glared at him for almost a full minute, then rubbed the center of her forehead and sighed. He really did try. And really was _trying_, sometimes. "Shut that off and come inside. Prat." He hadn't shaved, he was still wearing the same trousers as when he'd left, and he _still_ hadn't found a coat. The man was going to freeze to death, and god help him if he ever had to do laundry on his own. She had to take him back after that little display. He needed her. He obviously couldn't survive in the wild.

Absolutely not because she needed him too.

_12._  
When she was a week late, she didn't tell him. She didn't at two weeks, either. At three, she didn't have to. She should have known. He was punctual, organized, almost rigidly scheduled. Two days beforehand, he brought home chocolate and a brand-new novel. The day of, even in summer, her rattiest and favorite flannel nightie, the one that he hated so much he threatened to burn it at least once a week, appeared on the bed and the kettle never had time to cool. A back rub, a warm towel, and two entire hours where only Mr Darcy was allowed to talk. He knew. He was never off, not even by a day.

She didn't have to tell him. He came home, kissed her forehead, and disappeared into his office. Fifteen minutes later, he left with the scent of brandy on his breath and the collar of his coat turned up. She went in, and in the bin was a crumpled, half-finished form from human resources. Single was checked off. So was married. Name of beneficiary was "ask me in six months", and his shaky handwriting had left ink spots on the form. She silently replaced it in the bin and went to the sofa to sit with her head in her hands and Serpent and Gryff twining around her ankles. He was back within the hour, with a half-eaten curry and a small bag from Boots. She pissed on the stick, ate the curry, and leaned her head against his chest when the lines came up. They agreed to keep quiet, agreed to wait, and he quit smoking.

For two months.

Until the Friday she woke up with a headache, went to work with a stomachache, and came home Sunday with a heartache. The cot was already dismantled, the name books were binned. He didn't speak, just took her coat, then took her hands, then took her into the bedroom and sat against the headboard to pat her hair for an hour while she wept onto his thigh. She fell asleep in the middle of a sob, her hand locked so tight around his that her nails cut into his palm. He waited, patting her hair still, waited until her breathing smoothed into quiet, even snores, before he brought his hand up, pinched the bridge of his nose, and put so much effort into staying silent that by morning his throat felt as red and swollen as his eyes looked. Allergies, he explained to questions at the office, those damn cats.

  
_13._  
She knew his morning routine better than her own. He'd wake, stretch, grab his wand. Go to the mirror and put concealing charms across his face, blending the small and faded scars into his skin. First the one above his left eyebrow, second the vertical one on his cheek. Third was the one that bisected his lips and fourth the one under his chin. Last, the biggest one that cut almost diagonally across his torso. One scar was all he ever left unconcealed, and that morning, she asked him why. After a minute of silence while he stared into the mirror, his unblemished and reflected face turned slightly towards her, he licked his lips and shrugged.

"This," he said, running his fingers across his left forearm, tracing the nearly invisible snake and skull as easily as if it had still been black and looming from his skin. "This one, everyone already knows about, knows to look for. And they _do_ look. No point in hiding it." He touched his face, stroking across the hidden marks. His hand then went to his chest to trail over the line he hadn't concealed yet, stroking down from his collarbone, over a pale and pink nipple, wrapping around the curve of his ribs. "These, they bother people. When someone talks to me, I can see them staring at the scars. They don't see me, they just see some disfigurement. Rather avoid that, since I can."

She smiled, then, and stepped behind him. Both arms slid around his waist, both hands dragged up his stomach and plastered over his chest. Her eyes could just peep over his shoulder from this position, her hair trapped between his back and her breasts. She watched herself as one hand laid over his heart, one drifted up to his collarbone. Slowly, with just the point of a fingernail, she trailed down the scar, careful to cover each inch of it as she moved. Her eyes flicked to his in the mirror, seeing them closed as tight as his lips. Under her palm, his heart beat stronger and she felt him take a deep breath. "Relax," she murmured, rising up on her toes to set her lips against the base of his neck, the rounded knob of the top of his spine.

His next deep breath was audible, his entire chest moving with it, and his hand came up to cover hers on his heart. She flipped her hand, turned her palm up, and wrapped her fingers around his, stroking the pad of her thumb across his skin. Under her touch, tendons tightened as he clutched her, and his eyes opened to meet hers in the mirror. "Granger," he murmured, voice soft, and she shook her head, shushing him with a breath that stirred the tips of his hair. Dropping back to her heels, she pulled her hands free and spun him around, her grip at his waist insistent and answered. Looking up into his eyes, she gave another smile, one that brought his head down to hers and lips to lips, as if just the movement of her mouth could pull a kiss from him.

When she drew him back to the bed, she knelt between his thighs and her mouth followed the path her hand had taken, lingering over each inch of the roughened, silvery line down his chest. At the end of it, at his ribs, she opened her lips wide and sucked gently, leaving a red mark on the point of the scar. She moved her head, moved her mouth to his arm, and traced the other unconcealed scar with the point of her tongue, outlining the skull and snake with peppered kisses, smiling when she heard his breath catch in his throat. He shifted under her, chest rising beneath her hand, erection rising between her breasts, and when he reached down to pull her up to him, she trailed her fingers over the planes of his cheeks and the hidden marks on his face, whispering his name as he slid into her, his fingers locked on her hips. "None of these bother me, I've told you that," she murmured to him, licking the point of his chin. "They're part of you. I see _you_, not them, and my opinion is the one that counts."

The next morning, he woke, stretched, and grabbed his wand. She sat up to watch him shift to the edge of the bed, sheet falling into her lap. His shoulders tensed for a moment, and his head bowed as if he were staring at his chest. A handful of silent seconds passed before he twisted around, picked up her hand, and pressed her fingers to the scar on his cheek, then tossed his wand into her lap and went to shower.

  
_14._  
When she came home from a weekend with her parents, taking her mother shopping around Notting Hill and listening to her father rant about his handicap and how Bill Kelly refused to use anything but a nine-iron even when it was clear that a four-wood was appropriate, she hung her coat on the back of the door, laid her hand against the thick material of his cloak, then tipped her head into the fabric and took a deep breath. Cinnamon and a touch of vanilla. His cologne made him smell vaguely like a sweet, and when she'd asked him about it, he'd given a boyish grin and said, "Makes you want to lick me, right?"

Oh god, did it ever.

  
_15._  
He dropped a ring box on her book and held her coat out to her. "Put that on, and let's get going. We're late for dinner."

She stuck her tongue out at him and opened the box. Rubies and emeralds surrounded a diamond in a band that looked like silver but knowing him was pure platinum, and she held it up to him, still in the box. "First, do you call this a proposal, and second, do you not _remember_ how I feel about diamonds?"

He shook her coat. "That ring is two hundred years old, my great-great-grandfather picked that diamond up on holiday in Africa. Not one tribesman, miner, child, or house-elf was involved or bloodied to get it, and it's got 'Will you marry me?' engraved on the band. Now put it on, and stop complaining. It's not like you were planning to say no." He reared back suddenly, eyes wide. "You weren't, were you?"

She wasn't.


End file.
